Vehicle article carriers are used in a wide variety of applications to store articles above an outer body surface of a vehicle such as a car, sport utility vehicle, truck or mini van. Often, the outer body surface of the vehicle includes a pair of channels to which support slats of a vehicle article carrier can be secured. However, if a conventional elevated side rail is to be secured, it typically includes a pair of support feet at its outer most ends for holding a support rail portion above the outer body surface of the vehicle. Each of the support feet typically are secured to the outer body surface rather than to the channel. Thus, when attempting to mount the support feet, additional holes are required to be drilled in the outer body surface on both sides of the channel such that each of the support feet can be securely mounted to the outer body surface.
As will be appreciated, the need to drill additional holes into the outer body surface presents a number of undesirable consequences. The additional holes form means by which water or moisture can penetrate the outer body surface potentially causing corrosion to the outer body surface of the vehicle roof. The very act of drilling additional holes is time consuming and requires additional labor that ultimately adds to the overall cost of installing the vehicle article carrier.
Accordingly, it would be highly desirable to provide some form of adapter bracket that allows conventional support feet, which are intended to be mounted on the outer body surface, to be mounted to existing channels formed in the roof of a vehicle. In this manner, no additional holes would need to be drilled if a side rail with conventional support feet, rather than a slat, are to be mounted to the outer body surface. Such a bracket would eliminate the need to drill extra holes on opposing sides of the channels and would therefore expedite installation of the support feet as well as reduce the overall cost of assembly of the vehicle article carrier system onto the vehicle.